AwaitingLaunch_1397728623369

ICoC's true intent. It should be noted that EU was still very new to
conducting diplomatic outreach at this time: the 2009 Lisbon Treaty gave EU
the power to engage in the making of foreign and security policy, and ICoC
was one of the first international diplomatic efforts the EU undertook.
The U.S. withheld its official position on the draft CoC until January 2012,
when Secretary of State Hilary Clinton announced that the U.S. would not
sign this particular version of CoC but would instead work with partners and
use it to develop an International CoC that would have widespread support.
Prior to this announcement, there had been a large amount of discussion
about CoC within the U.S. government, including a wide interagency review,
an operations impact review done by the U.S. Department of Defence, and
Congressional concerns that this document was a back-door to a future
treaty that could potentially limit freedom of U.S. action in space.
Meanwhile, the European External Action Service (EEAS) began a series of
informal meetings around the world trying to garner support for CoC and
refinement of the language of CoC. A meeting was held in June 2012 in
Austria of interested parties (on the margins of the UN annual meeting of
its COPUOS to discuss concerns about the CoC. This did cause some
confusion for some, as the CoC is deliberately not going through the UN
process, even though the organisers have taken advantage of attendance at
UN meetings to also host outside discussions on CoC. A second draft of
CoC was released in June 2012, which attempted to incorporate some of the
comments received to date about the document. A second meeting was held
in the Ukraine in May 2013, which included representatives from 61
countries and ended up focusing mostly on procedural issues. rincipal
Adviser and Special Envoy for Non-Proliferation and Disarmament of the
EEAS Ambassador JacekBylica said at that point that they were going to
strive to get an agreed-upon document for CoC at some point in 2014. A
third draft of CoC was released in September 2013. In November 2013, a
follow-up meeting was held in Thailand, and reportedly led to much more
substantive discussions. Lady Catherine Ashton, High Representative of the
EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy/Vice President of the European
Commission, asserted then that the “EU launched a process of broad,
inclusive and transparent consultations on its proposal with all interested
states with the objective to achieve the widest possible support and has
54
announced its intention to conclude the process in the course of 2014.”
70 | Awaiting Launch: Perspectives on the Draft ICoC for Outer Space Activities